Chrono Trigger

Release: 1995
Developer/Publisher: Square Enix
Platform: PC
Genre: RPG, Active Time Battle
Gameplay Stats: 55 hours, 13/13 Endings/Achievements

So Chrono Trigger was a game that I missed when it originally came out. I tried playing it on emulator a couple times over the years and never made it more than a couple hours in. I kept reading that it was regarded as one of the best RPGs of all time and seeing that it just passed its 25th anniversary I decided to finally give it a proper go. In my experience there aren't many games that age well, and the ones that have more text seem to age worse than other games. Will this one live up to the hype?

In short, yes. This game holds up remarkably well in 2020. The story still had some cool twists and turns that I didn't see coming. I felt a couple heart strings be tugged at at different points through the story. There were a few cutscenes that were fully animated by Akira Toriyama, but the rest was serviceable pixel art. The music was beautiful and the sound effects were pretty spot on. I think it's a rare chiptune that can convey a lot of emotion even 25 years after it was composed, but the composer here nailed it. I recently backed a game on Kickstarter that is supposed to be a spiritual successor to Chrono Trigger and they signed on the composer for a couple songs. When I originally read that fact I wasn't stoked, but after playing Chrono Trigger I am stoked.

The plot here revolves around time travel as you might guess since the title contains the name Chrono. They do a good job conveying complicated mechanics that are part of time travel in an easily digestible way. There is a short cutscene at the beginning showing how events in the past shape events in the future and that sets the stage for many of the quests and interactions that are there for the rest of the story. They handle it with such simplicity and precision that it really is masterful. The translation was also on point here. They handled each character's voice consistently and in a way that was consistent in the framing of the story. This game really is top-teir from top to bottom.

My only little nitpicking issue is that the only achievements for the game are based on the 13 endings of the game. It felt really weird not to get my first achievement until I had played the game for about 32 hours. I was interested enough in the game that I was motivated to grind out the remaining achievements, but it was a slog towards the end. This game handles combat in a really interesting way compared to a lot of RPGs. Every enemy has a weakness, but for some enemies it's borderline essential to take advantage of it which is actually refreshing. Even on new game plus it would take me 3 attacks to kill an enemy that I could kill with a single spell on my first playthrough. I really felt like I had to learn about the game!

I really enjoyed my time with this, but I don't know that I would recommend that people go for all the endings. That last fight is too much of a slog when you have to do a 3 phase fight 12 different times. [9/10]